This event has been ended!
Queer Cinema for Palestine | premietanie krátkych filmov + diskusia
Queer Cinema for Palestine | screening of short films + discussion
Event by: Kino Úsmev
Location: Kasárenské námestie 2607/5 Parking, Kasárenské námestie 2607/5, Staré Mesto
Tickets: Get tickets
About event
"How can a film convey the voice of the oppressed? How does the fight for queer rights intersect with the fight against colonialism and genocide? And what does it mean to stand on the side of justice, even if it is uncomfortable?
These are the questions answered by the short film series that we will screen on June 27 at 6:00 p.m. at Kine Úsmev in Košice.
This event is part of of the international film initiative Queer Cinema for Palestine (QCP), which was created as an act of solidarity with all those who opposed the so-called pinkwashing - a strategy with which the state of Israel tries to cover up its participation in the occupation and violation of the human rights of Palestinians by presenting itself as a "leader in LGBTI+ rights". The QCP follows a call by the Palestinian Boycott, Sanctions and Divestment (BDS) movement, which asks cultural institutions and individuals not to participate in state-sponsored Israeli events such as TLVFest – the Tel Aviv International LGBTQ Film Festival. Several queer filmmakers around the world refused to cooperate with TLVFest and instead created their own platform to promote the Palestinian culture of resistance - Queer Cinema for Palestine. The film initiative takes place throughout the month of June in more than 60 countries around the world and includes a range of 6 short films with diverse perspectives and artistic approaches – from documentary narratives to experimental, poetic and highly political works. It is an international collection that reflects the queer Palestinian experience as an experience of physicality, desire, persistence, but also loss, expulsion and constant threat. The films were made in exile, in the occupied territories and in diasporas - and all of them are united by the effort to resist erasure.
List of films shown:
✦ A Message, Mama Ganuush, 2:51 min, Palestine (2026), English
A short documentary film capturing queer Palestinian voices in exile.
____________________________
✦ Ceasefire بِكَفِّي قَهْـر , Teodor Vladár, 23 min, Slovakia/Hungary (2025), English, Arabic, Slovak
Nawras, a Jordanian-Palestinian queer artist, has been living in Bratislava, Slovakia for the past 4 years. Living between two communities and opposing cultures, he tries to achieve something third: to find peace and a place he can call home. Now she is trying to reclaim the culture she was born into, but this time as she herself chooses to define it, creating a community that becomes her family.
____________________________
✦ The 5-Year Plan for Financial Independence, Dua Omari, 7 min, Palestine (2025), English
This video reflects on Palestinian history as a vicious circle of injustice and imagines a future in which the system remains unchanged and the violence continues. It exposes the failure of the international system to achieve real justice, offering only symbolic solutions that do not improve everyday life. Palestinian men and women are forced to adapt to conditions below the level of basic human dignity, held in false hope without a clear path to freedom or dignity. sixth birthday on tape and a final unconscious farewell to the missing home. Opening up like a road along the Nile, through the dreamy currents of Cairo, where the line between memory and present fades, part vision, part desire, part possibility. A fragile utopia awakens on those waters, a world where separation has never occurred, where return is still within reach and the long-lost home is back.
____________________________
✦ We Will Haunt Your Archive, R.R., 10 min, United States (2026), English
2. December 2023. A queer protest broke out in San Francisco in solidarity with Palestine. The film places this event in the long history of ACT UP activism during the AIDS crisis. It explores glitch as a radical feminist tactic of resistance to current regimes of surveillance and oppression.
____________________________
✦ Sorry, John Greyson, 7 min, Canada (2024), English
Portrait of three young women: Luna Alyaan, a young violinist from Gaza who was killed by an Elbit drone; Eden Golan, the Zionist singer who represented Israel at Eurovision 2024 in Malmö; and Greta Thunberg, who led protests against Eurovision that year. Sorry, a dark satire about Israel's misuse of the song for hasbara (propaganda) purposes, uses humor and pop culture to create a mix of agitprop to support the ongoing Eurovision boycott and Dump Elbit campaign. (Inspired by the Toronto Palestine Film Festival's tribute to art lost in genocide called Gaza Lives).
https://queercinemaforpalestine.org/2026/04/07/film-program-queer-cinema-for-palestine-2026/
These are the questions answered by the short film series that we will screen on June 27 at 6:00 p.m. at Kine Úsmev in Košice.
This event is part of of the international film initiative Queer Cinema for Palestine (QCP), which was created as an act of solidarity with all those who opposed the so-called pinkwashing - a strategy with which the state of Israel tries to cover up its participation in the occupation and violation of the human rights of Palestinians by presenting itself as a "leader in LGBTI+ rights". The QCP follows a call by the Palestinian Boycott, Sanctions and Divestment (BDS) movement, which asks cultural institutions and individuals not to participate in state-sponsored Israeli events such as TLVFest – the Tel Aviv International LGBTQ Film Festival. Several queer filmmakers around the world refused to cooperate with TLVFest and instead created their own platform to promote the Palestinian culture of resistance - Queer Cinema for Palestine. The film initiative takes place throughout the month of June in more than 60 countries around the world and includes a range of 6 short films with diverse perspectives and artistic approaches – from documentary narratives to experimental, poetic and highly political works. It is an international collection that reflects the queer Palestinian experience as an experience of physicality, desire, persistence, but also loss, expulsion and constant threat. The films were made in exile, in the occupied territories and in diasporas - and all of them are united by the effort to resist erasure.
List of films shown:
✦ A Message, Mama Ganuush, 2:51 min, Palestine (2026), English
A short documentary film capturing queer Palestinian voices in exile.
____________________________
✦ Ceasefire بِكَفِّي قَهْـر , Teodor Vladár, 23 min, Slovakia/Hungary (2025), English, Arabic, Slovak
Nawras, a Jordanian-Palestinian queer artist, has been living in Bratislava, Slovakia for the past 4 years. Living between two communities and opposing cultures, he tries to achieve something third: to find peace and a place he can call home. Now she is trying to reclaim the culture she was born into, but this time as she herself chooses to define it, creating a community that becomes her family.
____________________________
✦ The 5-Year Plan for Financial Independence, Dua Omari, 7 min, Palestine (2025), English
This video reflects on Palestinian history as a vicious circle of injustice and imagines a future in which the system remains unchanged and the violence continues. It exposes the failure of the international system to achieve real justice, offering only symbolic solutions that do not improve everyday life. Palestinian men and women are forced to adapt to conditions below the level of basic human dignity, held in false hope without a clear path to freedom or dignity. sixth birthday on tape and a final unconscious farewell to the missing home. Opening up like a road along the Nile, through the dreamy currents of Cairo, where the line between memory and present fades, part vision, part desire, part possibility. A fragile utopia awakens on those waters, a world where separation has never occurred, where return is still within reach and the long-lost home is back.
____________________________
✦ We Will Haunt Your Archive, R.R., 10 min, United States (2026), English
2. December 2023. A queer protest broke out in San Francisco in solidarity with Palestine. The film places this event in the long history of ACT UP activism during the AIDS crisis. It explores glitch as a radical feminist tactic of resistance to current regimes of surveillance and oppression.
____________________________
✦ Sorry, John Greyson, 7 min, Canada (2024), English
Portrait of three young women: Luna Alyaan, a young violinist from Gaza who was killed by an Elbit drone; Eden Golan, the Zionist singer who represented Israel at Eurovision 2024 in Malmö; and Greta Thunberg, who led protests against Eurovision that year. Sorry, a dark satire about Israel's misuse of the song for hasbara (propaganda) purposes, uses humor and pop culture to create a mix of agitprop to support the ongoing Eurovision boycott and Dump Elbit campaign. (Inspired by the Toronto Palestine Film Festival's tribute to art lost in genocide called Gaza Lives).
https://queercinemaforpalestine.org/2026/04/07/film-program-queer-cinema-for-palestine-2026/